


adolescent residents

by eldritchbee



Series: hope side / despair side [5]
Category: Dangan Ronpa - All Media Types, Super Dangan Ronpa 2
Genre: Canon Compliant, Fluff, Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-01-28
Updated: 2021-01-28
Packaged: 2021-03-14 16:08:05
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,625
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29048919
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/eldritchbee/pseuds/eldritchbee
Summary: When she stands and moves closer he doesn’t seem to notice. One of the batteries drops from between his fingers and rolls towards her. She picks it up, noting the salt caked around its edges. “Hey, hey, Souda?” He doesn’t look up. She moves closer still until she’s arms length and a few centimeters from him, prodding his shoulder with the battery -and now that makes him jump. His scream and the clatter of bits and pieces of remote control hurt her ears bad enough that she needs to cover them, but she considers it a success. That was him, that was the Souda she knew.---Hinata isn't the only one who has to collect all his hope shards. Takes place in canon, in Electric Avenue. Nanami and Souda play with an old Funbox and talk about how confusing dating sims are. That's it, that's the fic. Spoilers for SDR2, of course.
Relationships: Hinata Hajime & Soda Kazuichi, Nanami Chiaki & Soda Kazuichi
Series: hope side / despair side [5]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1472216
Kudos: 10





	adolescent residents

_ "all this time to make amends  
what do you do when all your enemies are friends  
now and then I'll try to bend under pressure  
wind up snapping in the end" _

* * *

She wasn’t expecting Hinata to read it out loud.

No, to be fair, she wasn’t expecting it at  _ all _ , information reserved for her and Monomi alone while they were here. It shouldn’t surprise her, the virus that held the island hostage was a particularly complicated one, horrifically on  _ par  _ with the Neo World Program’s data - created by the  _ Super High School Level Programmer _ her _ self _ . Any information that would lead them closer to the truth would likely lead to the despair that Monokuma and  _ his _ partner so wanted should be expected. When Monokuma came, she pulled herself deeper into the electronics store - she is prone to distraction, and she didn’t want to be pulled into that conversation at all.

Even moreso when she hears Souda’s voice, in a high pitched panic. All Monokuma does is ruffle feathers and leave, and she hears the sound of Souda breathing - hyperventilating. “Hey, Hinata?” 

When she peeks over the boxes she sees Hinata rest a hand on Souda’s shoulder. “Don’t… worry. Don’t worry, okay? He’s messing with us, like he always does.”

Souda nods, though his attention now seems more focused on something in his hands. When he does look up, he’s looking right at the electronics store. Nanami ducks down again.

“You wanna come finish exploring with me?”

There’s a long pause before Souda answers, “nah, nah. I think I’ll stay here and take shit apart like you said.”

“That’s  _ not _ what I said, but okay. Uh -”

“Don’t worry, man, you don’t have to, like, stay here or anything,” Souda grumbles. 

“I -” Hinata falters again. “I’ll just be wandering around if you need anything, I guess. When I’m done I’ll come back and get you, okay?”

“Yeah. Alright.”

Nanami goes back to her search in earnest afterwards, rummaging through boxes until  _ finally _ she comes across a nice looking Funbox, one controller. Which meant there had to be another somewhere, and there certainly had to be  _ games _ \- her parents wouldn’t leave her without them. As she moves closer and closer to the front of the shop, Nanami glances up to see Souda still standing in the same spot he was before, nervously fiddling with something in his hands.  _ The remote control for one of the televisions? _ he has the battery cover in his mouth, a spring falls to the ground.

When she stands and moves closer he doesn’t seem to notice. One of the batteries drops from between his fingers and rolls towards her. She picks it up, noting the salt caked around its edges. “Hey, hey, Souda?” He doesn’t look up. She moves closer still until she’s arms length and a few centimeters from him, prodding his shoulder with the battery -

and now  _ that _ makes him jump. His scream and the clatter of bits and pieces of remote control hurt her ears bad enough that she needs to cover them, but she considers it a success.  _ That _ was him,  _ that _ was the Souda she knew.

“Nanami -! What -! What the fuck!? You’re like, you’re a fucking electric car, I didn’t even hear y - where did you come from!? What the fuck!?”

She slides her hands from her ears and points over in the direction of the electronics store. Then, she holds up the little battery in her palm, “you dropped this, I called for you but you didn’t answer.” He plucks the battery from her hand, turning it over to scratch at some of the salt with his thumbnail.

“Oh.”

He looks again like he’s going to slip, and so she prods his shoulder again and points to the electronics store. “I found the newest Funbox -”

“Oh shit, a Funbox?”

“- um, yes? And a controller. But there’s only one. And no games. When you’re finished with that, um, can you help me look maybe?”

“Finished with wh -” she points to the ground where the broken controller sat. Souda bent to pick up specific pieces of it, shoving it into the pocket of his coveralls. The rest he kicked away. “Alright, let’s do this.”

It was another stretch of silence while they searched together, but after they found one game (a dungeon crawler), they started to chat more. “Souda, what’s your favorite type of game?” 

“Well, uh, I guess racing games? That’s all I really could play. I mean, one of my friends had an older Funbox and we’d play stuff when I went over, but I never like, had anything over than like, a handheld thing with a racing game I traded for this bike.”

“Huh? You traded a bike? For a game?”

He waves a hand, “My dad owns a shitty bike shop, it’s no biggie. It was an old abandoned one I fixed up and some dude wanted it so I said,  _ hey how about that thing? _ Actually, I messed around with it a lot and made it so the machine was attached to another bike I was playing with and riding the bike in real life would make the race cart go in the game. Then someone stole it from me, which fucking  _ sucked _ man I was having the time of my  _ life _ with that one. I wanted to make a bunch.”

Nanami puffs out her cheeks. “That’s horrible. That sounds like it would be very interesting to watch. Hm, I don’t think I would be able to use it. Maybe. I fall asleep too easily.”

Souda laughed nervously, “uh, even on a bike?”

“Probably,” she tips her head to the side, wondering if it was really such an odd thing to say. “I’ve never ridden one.”

“Oh shit wait,  _ how _ ?”

“... I… didn’t leave my house much. Oh, look, the second controller.”

“Oh yeah, you didn’t know how to do jump rope either before, right?”

“I can jump rope very well now. I think.”

“You’re probably better than me. Oh, found a game!” Souda called out, waving a little cartridge over. “It’s uh, oh,  _ Doki Doki Miss Librarian _ . Isn’t this old?”

She looks over his shoulder, pointing down at a number  _ 2 _ on the box. “A sequel. It’s a dating game isn’t it?” She thinks one of her mothers were fond of these, though she’s also certain her father  _ hated _ them.

“Yeah, my friend had it. It was one of his favorites. I wonder if he’s played this one. Or is playing it, whatever. I’m really bad at these, for some reason I always pick the wrong answers?” he waves the box in the air. “Like, why is it that being mean  _ works _ so much. I always got the whole  _ you’re not willing to fight for me, so farewell _ ! Endings. And, and! Why is it so weird to tell someone they’re hot in a swimsuit? By the way, Nanami, you looked really hot in that swimsuit at the beach party. Was that weird?”

“... I don’t know. Thank you?” Nanami hums, “did any of them ask you if you wanted to see their bone structure?”

“You! You! You were eavesdropping!”

“You speak very loudly.”   
  
“I-I- okay, look, was Hinata right? Is that really weird?”

“Um. Probably? I’m not very good at these either,” she frowns. “I agree. I don’t like when they try to kiss you out of nowhere. I don’t think I’d like that very much. But then I lose, because the target character loses interest.”

“Yeah! Yeah! Here! Here she is! The character I can  _ never _ get!” A blonde girl with blue eyes. Nanami nods.

“That doesn’t surprise me.”

“Hey!”

“I found a box of games. Hmm. Half of them are dating sims.” She wondered why her parents placed these in here. Nanami thinks if she were  _ ever  _ to despair, it would be because of a dating sim. “Do you think, maybe, Monokuma put these here?”

“Oh I fucking be - hey! That’s the racing game series I played!”

“Hey, Souda?”

“Yeah?”

“Can you get one of those TVs to work?”

“Yeah, you wanna bring it back to your room or something?”

“No, I have one there. I was thinking, maybe, we could play some of these right here. Maybe.”

He laughs nervously again, “the, uh, dating sims?”

“I meant more the racing game and the dungeon crawler but, well, I also like a challenge. Sometimes. Though this one seems nearly impossible. I think.”

Souda nods, unsure of what else to say to that. Playing a dating sim with Nanami seemed like it would be more awkward than challenging - the only person he can imagine himself dragging into that would be  _ Hinata _ \- but his conflicting feelings are starting to settle down. He thinks Kuzuryuu will be fine, and this island might be a little fun - hearing Ibuki sing was  _ weird  _ and  _ loud  _ but fun, and there was even a movie theatre he’d passed before coming here. A little escapism couldn’t hurt, both Hinata and Nanami seemed to agree with that. And so they set the television up right with the Funbox attached, settling down on two broken hard drives turned to the side. Their classmates came and went, and sometimes stopped to play as well.

When Hinata comes back around there’s surprise on his face at the scene in front of him. Souda was always anxious, but in a place like this his manic state lent more towards positivity. Nanami always looked tired, exhausted, but here she had more of a glint in her eyes. It makes him smile, though he turns down their offer to play. “I don’t want to interrupt,” he’d said before moving along. 

When the initial rush of new island exploration died down, they’re the last two left in Electric Avenue. 

**Author's Note:**

> Labelled "gen" but it can be romo if you want it to be for any of the three of them. 
> 
> Top lyrics and title: "Monkey Wrench" by the Foo Fighters.
> 
> Additionally, I reference "Nanami's parents" whenever I write anything from Nanami's point of view so: her "mothers" are Fujisaki and Gekkogahara, her "father" is Matsuda, Gekkogahara's the one who put the dating games in.


End file.
